1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic measuring device, a method of converting serial data to parallel data Bytes and a method to store the parallel data bytes. Particularly, the electronic measuring device is capable of conducting data analysis on sample data collected from its detection channels, storing the data efficiently in its memory and accurately reading the stored data.
2. Related Prior Arts
In an ever increasing digitalization of today's electronic products, the traditional oscilloscope is no longer capable of detecting signals from more than 8 to 16 channels. Although the in-circuit emulator (ICE) can solve many problems relating to digitalization, the actual time sequence problems still cannot be dealt by software-based in-circuit emulator. Additionally, ICE typically requires specialized computer systems specially designed for the software. As a result, a logic analyzer has become one of the most important devices for all computer engineers today. The logic analyzer is a circuit analysis device capable of placing sampled data in a structured format and conveniently displaying the operation of a digital circuit on a displaying screen.
During its detection process, a conventional logic analyzer, through its multiple detection channels, receives signals from the pins of an electronic component on one-on-one basis. This process is often referred to as data sampling. After data sampling, the detection channels send the data samples to a memory storage, and the data can then be shown on a display for reviews by the engineers. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the data storage architecture of a conventional logical analyzer. Under the conventional technology, the data stored in the logic analyzer contains all data sent to the memory 3 from all detection channels 21 in the detection channel module 2 in serial order. Although some of the detecting channels may not have received any electronic signals from the external device 1, those channels will transfer blank data to be stored in the memory 3 and fill up the memory when every time data is being transferred from the detection channels. With this type of storage method, in order to accurately read the data stored in the memory, detection channels must send blank data to the storage memory 3 even if they received. no signal from the external device 1. Consequently, all spaces in the storage memory are filled up when every time data is being transferred to the memory, which results in unnecessary waste of memory space.
Because of the above mentioned drawback, many other types of logic analyzers are developed by the industry with an aim to solve the problem. FIG. 2 is a diagram of another commonly known logic analyzer. Its detection channel module 4 has 16 detection channels 41 capable of receiving electrical signals from an external device 1. Similar to the logic analyzer shown in FIG. 1, the data received from the detection channels are transferred to the storage memory 3 in serial order. Unlike the previous logic analyzer, the detection channels 41 which do not receive data from the external device 1 do not send blank data to the memory. Although this type of logic analyzer is capable of utilizing memory storage more efficiently, it does not distinguish the data stored in its memory 3. It simply collects data from each detection channels and stores the data into the storage memory continuously. Because the data are not distinguished. by their source, the user must conduct complex analysis on the data to determine where each data bit comes from. Additionally, software used to conduct such analysis significantly increases the use of computing resources. Furthermore, when the memory 3 is depleted, the newly acquired data will overlay the stored data from the beginning of the data array. The overlay will result in the loss of the starting point of the data array and cause error in the data analysis.
The present invention will solve the above mentioned shortcomings of the existing conventional logic analyzer by providing a data processing and storage method that converts serial data to parallel data and store them efficiently in the memory.